Lawyers representing a Louisiana abortion clinic and at least two physicians filed an application in the Supreme Court on Monday asking the court to halt a Louisiana law that is identical to a Texas law the justices struck down in 2016.

The court is almost certain to deny this application in a 5-4 vote — possibly as soon as tonight. When it does so, it will effectively mark the end of Roe v. Wade.

Yes, the court is very unlikely to hand down an opinion this week which uses the words “Roe v. Wade is overruled.” But these abortion providers filed this application because a federal appeals court openly defied the Supreme Court’s most recent abortion decision. When the court refuses to enforce its own decision, that will send a clear signal to lower court judges throughout the country that they are free to uphold restrictions on abortion.

You better read this here.

Recommended reading: Roe v. Wade: The Abortion Rights Controversy in American History, 2nd Edition (Landmark Law Cases and American Society)

The Supreme Court of the United States is often the place where US laws meet their final and ultimate challenge. The Supreme Court Justices have to listen carefully and in an unbiased fashion to arguments that a current law is constitutional, vs. not constitutional. The Supreme Court does other things, they look at other kinds of cases, but this is a very common and critically important mode of operation for SCOTUS.

The lawyers charged with arguing in favor of the standing US law are part of the executive branch. They are part of the President’s team.

If Kavanaugh becomes a justice of the Supreme Court, he will have to recuse himself in any case where a plaintiff argues against the constitutionality of a standing US federal law. He has demonstrated a powerful, permanent, and indelible bias.

He won’t make much of a judge if he can’t really do his job.

One way or another, we’ve got to throw her out of office and replace her with a Democrat. But, in the meantime, there is an interesting project going on at Crown Pac.

Promise to donate money, at leat $20.20, if she votes Yes on Kavanaugh. The money will be used to fund the endorsed Democrat who ends up running against Collins in the next election.

A typical Maine Senate seat costs, I think, about $6 million to run for, if you are a well established incumbent like Collins. If this program raises about 3 million or so, that’s enough to knock her off her game if the Democrats can find a well liked candidate that knows how to run a campaign. There must be somebody in Maine like that.

The goal of the campaign is to raise $1.5 million. Obviously I think they should double that goal. So far, just under 50,000 people have pledged just over $1.3 million.

A good amount of that $6 or so million you need to run a campaign in Maine, may be one million bucks worth, maybe more comes from corporations, and probably, some of those corporations are boycottable. They include General Dynamics, DLA Piper, Elliot Management, the Cohen Group (different Cohen, I hope), and Lion’s Gate Entertainment.

Here’s what the good people of Maine are saying to Susan Collins:

CLICK HERE TO GET RID OF COLLINS

Booker released a chunk of the secreted Kavanaugh documents, possibly breaking a Senate rule. Breaking that rule, if he did break it, can result in his expulsion from the Senate.

When confronted with that prospect by Republican leaders, with Kavanaugh looking on and making funny faces, Booker said, “Bring it!”

Does this qualify as a constitutional crisis? It probably would if Booker is thrown out of the Senate and a few thousand citizen show up to put him back in the Senate.

Minnesota has, it appears, a fairly strict rule, and it is being challenged. The Supreme Court seems poised to decide against the Minnesota law, at least in part. You can read about it here, and it is all very interesting.

But in fact, the whole thing is BS, in a way that I doubt anyone is telling the Supreme Court. Here’s why.

Minnesota authorities suggest, as an example of how the law works, that a person could wear a rainbow t-shirt at a polling place, unless a gay rights issue was on the ballot. That is just one example of where the line between what is appropriate vs. not seems movable.

But what about this. What about the fact that when there is a US Senator or a President on the ballot, that we are, de facto, voting on abortion rights? Elections matter, it is said, for a number of reasons, but that phrase is most often invoked when the SCOTUS takes away some basic right, or otherwise makes a bone-headed decision (like Citizens United or any number of gun related outcome and opinions). Who is in the Senate and who is in the White House determine the outcome of key issues over which Americans fight in the political arena. Certain issues are perennial. They are always on the ballot.

If this is true, and it is true, then every election that involves a US Senator or President involves the issue of abortion. Yet, just as a rainbow may be taken as supportive of LGBTQ rights, anti-abortion t-shirts or posters would be supportive of one side on the abortion issue.

And, in Minnesota, some polling places are in churches. In some of these churches, in order to get from the entry door to the voting place, you have to talk down a gauntlet of anti-abortion posters. (This has been addressed in some cases, but in others, not. See this.)

Dear Supreme Court: A violation of the Minnesota law is practiced normally in Minnesota, and it is allowed because Minnesotans will never speak against a church, because one simply does not do that. You need to ask for a friend of the court briefing from an organization like Minnesota Atheists for your decision to not be, in the end, foolish.

…Let’s begin with the numbers. This Term, the Chamber was involved in 17 cases overall—directly representing one of its member companies in Canning, litigating as a party in UARG, and filing amicus briefs in 15 other cases. The Chamber’s 17 cases represent just under a quarter of the total cases set down for argument this Term.

All told, the Chamber racked up a record of 11 wins and 5 losses—or a 69% winning percentage. (One of its cases—Mt. Holly v. Mt. Holly Gardens Citizens in Action—settled before oral argument.) That means that, since Samuel Alito succeeded Sandra Day O’Connor on the Court in January 2006, the Chamber has won 70% of its cases (85 wins and 36 losses), compared with only 43% in the late Burger Court (15 of 35 from 1981-1986) and 56% in the stable Rehnquist Court (45 of 80 from 1994-2005). …

In a ruling that assures further legal battles, the high court found that backers of Proposition 8 did not have the legal right to defend the voter-approved gay marriage ban in place of the governor and attorney general, who have refused to press appeals of a federal judge’s 2010 ruling finding the law unconstitutional.

It was a 5-4 decision, usual suspects.

Reminder: Who is on the Supreme Court matters.

Reminder: Who is in the White House matters to who is on the Supreme Court.

Reminder: Which party controls the Senate matters to the ability of whomever is in the White House to determine who is on the Supreme Court.

Reminder: The Senate has boneheaded rules so the above reminder isn’t just about a majority, but about a “supermajority” of 60/100.

Reminder: The Republicans want to restrict marriage, what you do in your bedroom, and reproductive rights of women. The Democrats don’t.

Reminder: Party politics is important, ignore that at your peril.

From NPR:

Section 3 of the law defines marriage as “a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife” and a spouse as “a person of the opposite sex who is a husband or a wife.” That provision had been struck down by eight lower courts before the Supreme Court’s 5-4 ruling in United States v. Windsor.

This decision means that legally married same-sex couples are now entitled to the same federal benefits as married opposite sex couples.

Justice Kennedy wrote the majority opinion. Roberts, Scalia, Thomas and Alito dissented.

Reminder: Who is on the Supreme Court matters.

Reminder: Who is in the White House matters to who is on the Supreme Court.

Reminder: Which party controls the Senate matters to the ability of whomever is in the White House to determine who is on the Supreme Court.

Reminder: The Senate has boneheaded rules so the above reminder isn’t just about a majority, but about a “supermajority” of 60/100.

Reminder: The Republicans want to restrict marriage, what you do in your bedroom, and reproductive rights of women. The Democrats don’t.

Reminder: Party politics is important, ignore that at your peril.

The deck is stacked for a more conservative ruling because Justice Kagan will recuse as she worked on the law while in the Obama administration.

The US Justice Department has been hammering away at the Arizona Law in lower courts. One of the key issues is whether or not a state can or should take on key aspects of immigration enforcement that are normally under Federal control. Arizona’s counter argument is that the Federal system is “broken” so the state must step in. So far, a Federal Court has partially gutted the law, according to the Washington Post,

… making it a state crime to be in the country illegally and failing to register with the federal government; making it illegal to seek work or working when not authorized; requiring state and local officers to try to determine the status of someone arrested, stopped or detained if they believe the individual might be in the country unlawfully; and allowing warrantless arrest of anyone who they have probable cause to believe might have violated laws that would make them deportable under federal law.

There are several other state-level immigration laws roughly similar to Arizona’s. They are not always found in border states, but they are typically found in conservative states with specific racist agendas and explicitly anti-Black Guy President elected officials. In other words, this fight relates to the handling of race in Americas and more broadly to the Culture Wars. It is important. The Federal Government has attacked those laws as well. Therefore, a decision from the SCOTUS will have wide ranging effects.

HERE is the PDF file of the filing (right click and “save as”).

The long and the short of it: The EEOC has rules about hiring and firing designed to avoid discrimination. Churches claim that they need to be able to discriminate (or at least not be held accountable for discrimination) because it is their religious thang to hire and fire who they want because they are churches. More specifically, from one perspective, pastors and such are “called” not really hired, and from another perspective (leading to the same outcome) church communities, they say, need to be able to chose their own religions.

Like if they wanted to fire Jesus, back in the old days, the Roman version of the EEOC would have no case if it claimed that the church was being, say, antisemitic.

There is a law that has been on the books for decades that seems to provide this exception for churches, but that is being challenged.

Here is an abstract from Cornell’s Legal Information Institute of the case:

Respondent Cheryl Perich taught for five years at Petitioner, Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School (“Hosanna-Tabor”), including four years as a commissioned minister. In 2004, Hosanna-Tabor hired a new teacher to fill Perich’s position after Perich missed several months of teaching due to narcolepsy. When Hosanna-Tabor did not permit Perich to return to her former position, Perich threatened to sue under the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”). Hosanna-Tabor fired Perich, and Perich initiated legal proceedings with the Respondent Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”), alleging that Hosanna-Tabor fired her in retaliation for threatening to sue. Hosanna-Tabor argues that the ministerial exception to the ADA, which prevents employment suits against religious entities by their religious employees, bars Perich’s lawsuit because she fulfilled an important religious role. Perich and the EEOC contend that there is no ministerial exception under the anti-retaliation provisions of the ADA, and that the Establishment Clause, freedom of association principles, and Free Exercise Clause do not bar her suit. The United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit determined that Perich did not fall under the ministerial exception because she taught secular subjects with minimal religious components. The Supreme Court will decide whether the ministerial exception applies to a teacher at a religious school who teaches both secular and religious material.

According to Howard Friedman (a law expert guy):

Hosanna- Tabor raises the question of how many other employees of religious organizations should be subject to the same risks of having no recourse when they have been dismissed for frivolous or perverse reasons having no relation to religious doctrine. The 6th Circuit held that whether an employee is a “minister” for purposes of this exemption depends on whether “the employee’s primary duties consist of teaching, spreading the faith, church governance, supervision of a religious order, or supervision or participation in religious ritual and worship.” It found that Cheryl Perich’s duties were not primarily religious so she could pursue a claim that she was dismissed in violation of the Americans With Disabilities Act. Some other circuits have concluded that the ministerial exception applies so long as an employee of a religious organization has some religious duties or responsibilities, even if those are not the person’s primary duties. That test would have precluded Perich from suing.

Churches. They want to act just like businesses. But then they want to be treated like something special. This is clearly a cake-eat-also situation.